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"From its chamber comes the whirlwind, and cold from the scattering winds." - Job 37:9.

"The wind blows to the south and turns to the north; round and round it goes, ever returning on its course".

Saturday, July 30, 2011

RECAP: Tropical Entity Don made landfall along the SE Texas last night between 8-9pm as expected. As noted, the Hurricane Center believed that it would de-solve within 24 hours...in the post yesterday we gave it a shot of 12 hours , possibly.The official proclamation of complete and utter burial of the system was made until 3am...6-7 hours after landfall. Although I've heard some statements on TV that the drought soaked it up, technically this really isn't possible. The reality is that the air over Texas was dry to start with and there was shearing aloft hitting it from two angles. It was actually a bit amazing how quickly the storm dissolved the second it touched the coast.

TODAY: Today we begin a slow and painful transition, and as suppositioned yesterday, will likely end up be 'the all out of all outs' - the "Pit and the Pendelum" - the bathing suit on a hot car seat- driest day statewide. Surface ridge and a bubble high across Central Florida (the Cape area specifically this hour), with a slowly retreating mid-level ridge axis back to its previous position over the South Central States is in progress. There has definitely been more moisture moving in from the north and northeast...but it's mainly upper level moisture advecting in on the descending (sinking) side of that feature. South Florida is drying out significantly this morning but that will likely change late today. Moisture or no moisture it makes no difference, because based on at least the RUC mode at leastl...the atmosphere is too warm aloft to support anything but a low topped rain shower today. I'd expect the best likelihood of such to be very late today along the SW Florida Coast, around Tampa Bay, and west of the forested area of Ocala to west of Gainesville.

This shows the surface high near the Cape area, and the retreating mid-level ridge now actually centered off this image to the WNW. It will continue to progress in the direction during the next 48 hours and begin to erode along its east side as a trough starts to build south down the eastern seaboard to replace it. Much of Florida is on the descending, subsident/sinking side of the mid-level high today.

TODAY-SUNDAY: Pretty much zero rain chances outside of some remote showers of low impact of very small size today. Otherwise, highs in the low-mid 90Fs inland and close to 88F-90F at the beach. Pretty much the same as yesterday in other words, but likely a bit warmer over the interior where some cooling rains likely prevented temperatures in and near the areas that received some rain would have been otherwise. A slight increase in showers and maybe some isolated thunder is possible later Sunday afternoon, but just exactly where the best chance of that is still TBD. Most likely it will be over North and North Central Florida, although the latest NAM suggests near Osceola County. But since when has the NAM been even remotely reliable? Not sure..maybe back in April and May. Another day to figure out..that's fine. But not expecting wide spread rains as of yet.

MONDAY: This is truly the transition day with increased thunderstorm chances...play it by ear as to where as the time draws closer, but hedged to fall back on the old GFS solution of mostly North - North Central Florida up to JAX and down the spine toward SW Florida.

TUESDAY-WEDNESDAY: Best days to receive some by then much needed rains, with cooler temperatures inland due to earlier development of shading cumulus clouds. One of these days might see some stronger storms, most likely Tuesday along the north half of the state and Wednesday over the South Half.

BEYOND-TROPICS: No point in going any further. Invest 91L will be on the approach. The GFS continues to insist on development of a hurricane by this time, whereas the majority of other models have the area remaining much less invigorated, remaining nearly to some degrees (with variation) a well organized wave until it approaches Puerto Rico...if it continues moving WNW..or only a wave if it stays to the south. I noticed that only 2 of 17 tropical forecast track models take the system south of Puerto Rico. On the other-hand, there is the option that the system will be taken into two pieces, one taking off toward the NW and eventually curving N-NE with the trough just off the Florida East Coast..with the southern sector continuing west as a wave. Then there's the GFS.

If it verified, the likelihood of the storm impacting Florida in August is equal to that of the state receiving snow. It is forming an upper level cold core low to form and retrograde off the east coast to directly over the state, sending what would be a small hurricane Emily off to the North and eventually NE in rapid fashion. This low then moves further west, placing the state in deep, moist SW flow aloft. Granted, this was a 06z run, which from my experiences, 06z and 18z runs tend to go haywire using modified old sounding data that is by then nearly 12 hours old by the time the run has completed... so my flags are immediately lowered to half mast in absurdness to that resolve.

In brief, any forecast beyond Wednesday..as it stands today...is complete hypothetical conjecture..with only one wood leg to stand on..with crutch in hand for support. The forecast should become much less difficult to determine though by later Tuesday once the tropical Invest 91L has either become (or not) something...combined with what the synoptic (large scale) features have in store at that time.